Rats! Rodents get a break as town stops poisoning

Friday

Jan 2, 2009 at 2:00 AM

By Eliot Baker I&M Staff Writer

Curtailing Nantucket’s long-running rodenticide program will save dollars and, presumably, a few rats, too. Health Department director Richard Ray said recently the town will cease its three-decade long extermination campaign against the island’s rat population.

More considerations came into play in the decision than this year’s projected budget shortfall, said Ray at a Board of Selectmen meeting last month.

“It’s a costly program that has increased over the last 30 years,” he said. “More importantly to me than cost is the liability issue. We’re not getting into the field any longer so we don’t have control to deal with the placement of this stuff. We don’t want to see an incident where a family pet gets into this stuff due to improper placement.”

One of the main problems, particularly because the Health Department due to such high demand in almost all cases now allows property-owners or caretakers to apply the poison themselves, is that over time, island rodents have become resistant to the pesticides used against them. Those rodents that can withstand a certain dose will produce more pesticide-resistant offspring. Every time the dosage was increased or altered, a new breed of poison-resistant rats emerged – evolution in motion.

“Rodents, like individuals, become immune,” said Ray. “The stuff we were using wasn’t working. We went to a stronger block three times. Our problem was the stronger the bait, the longer it lasted in the rodent’s system. If a raptor or a pet got a hold of a rat carcass, they would be in trouble.”

The pesticide is so strong in its current form that the town carries no antidote for it, thus dooming an inadvertently poisoned pet. Applying the rat poison responsibly requires proper technique to ensure no collateral damage to pets, endangered species or other innocent wildlife.

In the beginning of the project, Ray often applied the poison himself. But the health department’s house-calls became less frequent as his office began receiving hundreds of requests.

“If someone can’t apply the poison like, say, an old woman in a wheelchair, I might go into a crawl space and apply the stuff,” said Ray, but otherwise, it’s up to the homeowner.

In addition to being reviled pests, the island’s rats are known carriers of tick-borne Lyme disease, a painful, potentially disabling affliction that has sent many islanders to the hospital. Lyme disease cases increased 30 percent in 2008, although in fairness to rats, deer ticks have been considered the major contributor to the upsurge in reported cases. Referencing a September Boston Globe article about Nantucket’s supposed rat problem that grew out of an Inquirer and Mirror story about the pests near Consue Springs, selectmen chairman Mike Kopko quipped:

“Maybe we will get a Globe story now saying that we don’t have rats any longer.”

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